The recent revelations of a International Energy Administration whistleblower that the IEA might have distorted essential oil projections under intense U.S. pressure is, if true (and whistleblowers rarely step forward to advance their careers), a slow-burning thermonuclear surge on future international oil production. The Bush administration's actions in pressing the IEA to underplay the rate of decrease from existing oil fields while overplaying the possibilities of finding new reserves have the potential to throw governments' long-term preparation into chaos.

Whatever the reality, increasing long term worldwide needs appear certain to outstrip production in the next years, especially offered the high and rising expenses of establishing brand-new super-fields such as Kazakhstan's overseas Kashagan and Brazil's southern Atlantic Jupiter and Carioca fields, which will require billions in financial investments before their first barrels of oil are produced.

In such a situation, ingredients and substitutes such as biofuels will play an ever-increasing role by stretching beleaguered production quotas. As market forces and rising prices drive this innovation to the forefront, one of the richest prospective production locations has been completely ignored by investors already - Central Asia. Formerly the USSR's cotton "plantation," the area is poised to end up being a major gamer in the production of biofuels if enough foreign financial investment can be acquired. Unlike Brazil, where biofuel is manufactured largely from sugarcane, or the United States, where it is mainly distilled from corn, Central Asia's ace resource is a native plant, Camelina sativa.

Of the former Soviet Caucasian and Central Asian republics, those clustered around the coasts of the Caspian, Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan have actually seen their economies boom due to the fact that of record-high energy prices, while Turkmenistan is waiting in the wings as a rising manufacturer of natural gas.

Farther to the east, in Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, geographical seclusion and relatively scant hydrocarbon resources relative to their Western Caspian next-door neighbors have actually mainly hindered their capability to capitalize rising global energy demands up to now. Mountainous Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan stay largely reliant for their electrical requirements on their Soviet-era hydroelectric facilities, however their increased need to produce winter electrical energy has actually led to autumnal and winter water discharges, in turn severely impacting the agriculture of their western downstream next-door neighbors Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan.

What these three downstream nations do have however is a Soviet-era legacy of farming production, which in Uzbekistan's and Turkmenistan case was mainly directed towards cotton production, while Kazakhstan, starting in the 1950s with Khrushchev's "Virgin Lands" programs, has ended up being a significant producer of wheat. Based upon my conversations with Central Asian government officials, given the thirsty demands of cotton monoculture, foreign propositions to diversify agrarian production towards biofuel would have excellent appeal in Astana, Ashgabat and Tashkent and to a lesser level Astana for those hardy investors willing to bank on the future, especially as a plant indigenous to the area has already shown itself in trials.

Known in the West as false flax, wild flax, linseed dodder, German sesame and Siberian oilseed, camelina is drawing in increased clinical interest for its oleaginous qualities, with several European and American business already investigating how to produce it in business amounts for biofuel. In January Japan Airlines carried out a historic test flight using camelina-based bio-jet fuel, ending up being the very first Asian carrier to try out flying on fuel originated from sustainable feedstocks during a one-hour presentation flight from Tokyo's Haneda Airport. The test was the conclusion of a 12-month evaluation of camelina's operational performance capability and possible industrial viability.

As an alternative energy source, camelina has much to advise it. It has a high oil material low in saturated fat. In contrast to Central Asia's thirsty "king cotton," camelina is drought-resistant and unsusceptible to spring freezing, requires less fertilizer and herbicides, and can be used as a rotation crop with wheat, which would make it of specific interest in Kazakhstan, now Central Asia's significant wheat exporter. Another bonus of camelina is its tolerance of poorer, less fertile conditions. An acre planted with camelina can produce up to 100 gallons of oil and when planted in rotation with wheat, camelina can increase wheat production by 15 percent. A heap (1000 kg) of camelina will include 350 kg of oil, of which pushing can extract 250 kg. Nothing in camelina production is wasted as after processing, the plant's particles can be used for animals silage. Camelina silage has a particularly appealing concentration of omega-3 fatty acids that make it an especially great livestock feed prospect that is simply now gaining acknowledgment in the U.S. and Canada. Camelina is quick growing, produces its own natural herbicide (allelopathy) and contends well against weeds when an even crop is established. According to Britain's Bangor University's Centre for Alternative Land Use, "Camelina could be an ideal low-input crop suitable for bio-diesel production, due to its lower requirements for nitrogen fertilizer than oilseed rape."

Camelina, a branch of the mustard household, is indigenous to both Europe and Central Asia and barely a brand-new crop on the scene: archaeological proof suggests it has been cultivated in Europe for a minimum of three millennia to produce both veggie oil and animal fodder.

Field trials of production in Montana, presently the center of U.S. camelina research, showed a vast array of outcomes of 330-1,700 pounds of seed per acre, with oil material differing between 29 and 40%. Optimal seeding rates have been determined to be in the 6-8 pound per acre range, as the seeds' little size of 400,000 seeds per lb can develop issues in germination to accomplish an ideal plant density of around 9 plants per sq. ft.

Camelina's potential could allow Uzbekistan to start breaking out of its most dolorous tradition, the imposition of a cotton monoculture that has deformed the country's attempts at agrarian reform given that achieving self-reliance in 1991. Beginning in the late 19th century, the Russian government figured out that Central Asia would become its cotton plantation to feed Moscow's growing textile industry. The process was sped up under the Soviets. While Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan were likewise bought by Moscow to sow cotton, Uzbekistan in specific was singled out to produce "white gold."

By the end of the 1930s the Soviet Union had become self-sufficient in cotton; 5 decades later on it had actually become a significant exporter of cotton, producing more than one-fifth of the world's production, concentrated in Uzbekistan, which produced 70 percent of the Soviet Union's output.

Try as it may to diversify, in the absence of alternatives Tashkent remains wedded to cotton, producing about 3.6 million tons every year, which generates more than $1 billion while constituting approximately 60 percent of the country's hard cash income.

Beginning in the mid-1960s the Soviet federal government's directives for Central Asian cotton production largely bankrupted the region's scarcest resource, water. Cotton utilizes about 3.5 acre feet of water per acre of plants, leading Soviet organizers to divert ever-increasing volumes of water from the area's 2 primary rivers, the Amu Darya and Syr Darya, into ineffective irrigation canals, resulting in the significant shrinkage of the rivers' final destination, the Aral Sea. The Aral, as soon as the world's fourth-largest inland sea with a location of 26,000 square miles, has shrunk to one-quarter its original size in among the 20th century's worst eco-friendly catastrophes.

And now, the dollars and cents. Dr. Bill Schillinger at Washington State University just recently described camelina's organization design to Capital Press as: "At 1,400 pounds per acre at 16 cents a pound, camelina would bring in $224 per acre; 28-bushel white wheat at $8.23 per bushel would amass $230."

Central Asia has the land, the farms, the watering infrastructure and a modest wage scale in comparison to America or Europe - all that's is the foreign investment. U.S. financiers have the cash and access to the competence of America's land grant universities. What is certain is that biofuel's market share will grow gradually; less specific is who will reap the advantages of developing it as a viable concern in Central Asia.

If the recent past is anything to pass it is not likely to be American and European investors, fixated as they are on Caspian oil and gas.

But while the Japanese flight experiments suggest Asian interest, American financiers have the academic competence, if they are ready to follow the Silk Road into establishing a new market. Certainly anything that minimizes water use and pesticides, diversifies crop production and enhances the great deal of their agrarian population will get most cautious consideration from Central Asia's federal governments, and farming and veggie oil processing plants are not only much less expensive than pipelines, they can be constructed faster.

And jatropha curcas's biofuel potential? Another story for another time.